This isn’t directly answering the question of “should I drop university”, but here’s something that I wrote to another young person who was asking me what I’d study if I was young and in the beginning of my studies now (machine translated from Finnish in case you wonder why it doesn’t sound like my usual voice):
I’d probably aim to study something that genuinely interests me, feels meaningful right away, and could potentially provide a livelihood in the future. A program combining psychology and computer science would still align well with my interests. This time around, I’d try to include more mathematics and statistics coursework, as I’ve often wished I understood them better for interpreting research papers. These are subjects I’ve found particularly challenging to learn independently.
Of course, in the future we might be able to ask AI to explain everything, but explanations are more effective when you have solid foundational knowledge to build upon. My main goal would be to enjoy my studies and feel like I’m learning interesting material that’s not only fascinating but also broadly applicable and useful long-term. Computer science, psychology, math, and statistics have proven to be exactly that kind of knowledge so far. Even if AI eventually makes these skills less relevant professionally, I’d still have developed my thinking in valuable ways through studying them.
This isn’t directly answering the question of “should I drop university”, but here’s something that I wrote to another young person who was asking me what I’d study if I was young and in the beginning of my studies now (machine translated from Finnish in case you wonder why it doesn’t sound like my usual voice):